Gorgeous Gorges & More Mighty Mountains
Trip Start
Jan 30, 2010
1
103
111
Trip End
Jul 27, 2011
Where I stayed
Glen Helen, Northern Territory, Australia
Friday, April 15, 2011
Next morning we travelled to Ormiston Gorge to do the Gorge and Pound Trek, a 7km full circuit walk of the area, up and down slopes and across the floor of the pound before returning along back through the Gorge via the main waterhole. It was quite the tough walk. There were lots of hills to climb, rocks and boulders to scale and due to recent floods, we had to swim the last portion which was actually quite pleasant as we were rather hot. It took us through some of the most spectacular scenery and was well worth the effort! It took us approx 4 hours to complete the walk. It was just after lunch, so we headed back to camp for a well earned rest. The weather is a balmy 26° - perfect! We ventured back to the homestead tonight to listen to Slim Pickins again, but as he doesn't start playing till 8pm, we were both pretty much asleep. He was quite entertaining, no spoon or egg playing for us tonight though, and we were back to the van asleep by 9:30pm!
Day 3 we headed west and checked out Tylers Pass Lookout. What an amazing view! Bumpy undulating hills, covered in green, what looks like velvet, for miles in one direction but in the distance, an awesome visual of Tnorala (Gosse Bluff) a HUGE crater caused by a comet approx 142million years ago! The crater has a 5km wide circular rim which rises up from the flat surrounding landscape and is quite spectacular to see. The closer we drove to the crater, the actual size of the thing began to sink in! HUGE! We were able to drive in on a 4WD track which took us to the centre edge of the crater. We followed a walk throughout the crater floor, then climbed to a lookout on the rim to gain a better scope. Bloody amazing, it really was quite spectacular. From the crater, we ventured further along in the hope of getting to the historic township of Hermannsburg, where Albert Namatjira lived. Unfortunately the dirt road was quite washed out in places due to the recent flooding, so we decided it wasn’t worth the trek. We headed back to the campground’ via yet another lovely Redbank Gorge, a beautiful narrow gorge with cathedral height walls towering above. We took our 'noodles’ (floating devices) on the 20 min trek into the gorge planning to bob around in the water and cool off. The damage from the recent passing of water through the area was quite obvious here with pathways washed out and debris gathered around the bases of the trees around the area. The Gorge itself is a very, very narrow waterway through the tall chunky rocks and it looked so inviting but man, it was floggin freezing! The sun doesn’t reach the water and just putting our feet in gave us brain freeze! So much for taking a dip! It would have been heaps of fun had we had a canoe, although we would never have been able to carry it in there! It was another lovely, quiet serene place so we enjoyed the peace and beauty and took it all in.
Gorges, mountains, lovely walks, great swimming holes and spectacular viewing spots, something for everyone here in the West Macdonnell Ranges and only 135km from Alice Springs! We absolutely loved it!
